# Alliance Selection Alliance selection occurs before the playoff matches. During this the top 8 alliances are chosen. The captains of each alliance are chosen from the top 8 ranked teams from qualifications, they then choose an alliance from 1st alliance to 8th alliance. The 8th alliance then chooses a second partner and then alliances choose a second partner from 8th to 1st alliances. During selection, a captain of an alliance will select a team, that team can then either reject or accept the invitation. If a team rejects an invitation, they can no longer be selected into another alliance. If they accept but are one of the alliance captains that have not yet chosen any partners, they can accept and their spot will be filled by the next highest ranked alliance until there are 8 captains to select teams. After all alliances have 3 members, the next 8 highest ranked alliances will be asked to be ready to be a backup bot for any alliance that has a robot that is unable to compete, in which case the highest ranked backup bot will be chosen to be the backup bot for the alliance. --- # Agent Instructions: Querying This Documentation If you need additional information that is not directly available in this page, you can query the documentation dynamically by asking a question. Perform an HTTP GET request on the current page URL with the `ask` query parameter: ``` GET https://docs.iowacityrobotics.org/competitions/regionals/alliance-selection.md?ask= ``` The question should be specific, self-contained, and written in natural language. The response will contain a direct answer to the question and relevant excerpts and sources from the documentation. Use this mechanism when the answer is not explicitly present in the current page, you need clarification or additional context, or you want to retrieve related documentation sections.